Author: Christian Calgie

After a weekend of speculation, Sam Gyimah – former Tory MP for East Surrey before losing the whip 2 weeks ago – has been unveiled as the latest defector to the Lib Dems. Read Gyimah’s explanation of his decision here.

As one Twitter user points out, with Sam’s defection that brings the average Lib Dem MP majority is negative 6,800. Just to squeeze out any remaining air of democracy from the party’s reputation…

This week, old footage has re-emerged of the 2001 Ipswich By-election. Not usually where Guido would expect to find the most riveting content…

This, however, was a by-election with a twist. When the result was announced the new MP was welcomed to the stage with a bizarre laser rave show, put on by the local council, which concluded with sparklers and confetti. The elderly returning officer took the whole thing in her stride…

Former leader of the National Union of Mineworkers, Arthur Scargill, has called on all socialists to oppose any Labour MPs wanting to stay in the European Union. Good old traditional Labour…

Scargill proffered his Brexit call to arms at a meeting of the left-wing Brexit Group, Leave Fight Transform (LeFT), saying “every single MP who wants us to go back into Europe should be opposed… that is my view, as a socialist, as a Marxist”.

Scargill went even further, criticising his former comrade, Jeremy Corbyn, for his Brexit u-turn from opposing the Lisbon Treaty to now creating a pro-EU Labour Party that is “indistinguishable from the 21 MPs who have left the Tory Party”. This will be an easy point for Boris to score at the next PMQs…

Ten independent councillors elected to Hartlepool Council in May – turfing out the governing Labour Party in the process – have defected en masse to the Brexit Party, meaning the party now controls its first council in coalition with the Tories. At least the 70% of Hartlepool residents who voted for Brexit can rely on their council backing them, unlike Remain MP Mike Hill…

The new council composition therefore is:

10 Brexit Party

10 Labour

4 Socialist Labour

3 Conservatives

3 Putting Seaton First

2 Independents

1 For Britain

The defecting 10 met with the Brexit Party at Nigel Farage’s rally in Sedgefield two days ago, where they informed Richard Tice of their decision. Guido suspects this will be far from the last council taken over by the Brexit Party if we don’t leave on the 31st…

The Remaniacs Podcast has reacted with fury after discovering the Government’s ‘prepare for Brexit’ ads are being broadcast in front of the latest episode.

Dear listeners, if you’re getting #GetReadyForBrexitAdBollocks before your podcast, please understand that a] We don’t get to choose the automated pre-rolls, and b] We will be putting this slice of Gove’s £100m to a use that will please one and all. Watch this space.

A party’s conference is their opportunity to allow members to debate policy, market their party to donors, and show the public the best of what their party has to offer. The Labour party are ensuring they tick this last box this year with a number of very questionable fringe events this year, featuring Jackie Walker and Chris Williamson.

Labour conference-goers can also look forward to a “Labour Against the Witchhunt” meeting with Ken Livingstone and Jackie Walker. The problem for Labour is surely within their party these views are no longer fringe…

The second referendum campaign for Tory MPs, Right to Vote, set up by Phillip Lee, no longer contains a single Tory MP among their ranks, following multiple defections, resignations and withdrawals of the whip by the Government. Coincidentally the website and campaign have since folded…

At its height, the group contained 10 Tory MPs in its fold, however, following a record number of MPs changing party, the supposedly Conservative campaign is now led by a Lib Dem and counts four independents, one ‘The Independents’ MP and one ‘The Independent Group for Change’ MP among others. Keeping up?

The only sign the group was ever Tory-affiliated is the two remaining Tory Lords, who will be grateful that Boris said he wouldn’t withdraw the whip from any Lords supporting the Surrender Bill. A good demonstration of the change seen in British politics over the last year.

This morning it has been reported Boris is proposing a new 12-mile bridge between Scotland and Northern Ireland to mitigate the backstop. Days since last Boris bridge suggestion: 0

The DUP believes such an infrastructure project could help solve a “major positive impact on both countries economically”. And could act as a big bung to keep them on side during tricky EU negotiations…

Fuelling speculation that the ambitious project may be imminent, the DUP’s Director of Policy, Lee Reynolds, Tweeted the link to a BBC News article about an even longer bridge entitled “China opens ‘longest’ sea bridge”. Good to see the DUP and Number 10 once again engineering civility…

The Edinburgh Court of Session has ruled prorogation Parliament unlawful on appeal. Importantly, this ruling does not cancel prorogation. The real showdown will be in the Supreme Court next week. Developing…

UPDATE: Read the full ruling here:

UPDATE II:The reason the case was brought in Scotland is that Scottish law differs hugely from English and Welsh law, particularly over constitutional matters. Expert lawyer David Allen Green puts “chances of the action succeeding in London as zero”…

“something which unconstitutional can also be unlawful in Scotland, even if held to be lawful by High Court in London”

That is why I and others would have put the chances of the action succeeding in London as zero

And that is why cannily the action was launched in Scotland, where judges and the law would be far more receptive

Four in five MPs believe that public attitudes towards politicians have been changed for the worse by social media.

Research commissioned by Vuelio, the political and media software provider, has found that MPs believe social media has a negative impact on politics, with four in five (81%) of the 137 MPs surveyed believing public attitudes towards politicians have been changed for the worse as a result of social media. The research is released at a time of heightened speculation regarding an early general election.

According to MPs, there are specific ways in which social media has damaged public engagement. Over three quarters (79%) believe social media has made it difficult for the public to source information from trustworthy sources and 78% believe it leads to people being overloaded with information. This impacts policy making, with two in five (42%) MPs believing social media has changed the policy making process for the worse, and a third (36%) believe it has changed public understanding of policy for the worse.

While MPs believe, on balance, that social media has had negative impact on politics, they do recognise some positives. Almost half (47%) of MPs say it has improved the transparency of politics and around two in five (44%) say it has improved engagement between politicians and the public.

Joanna Arnold, CEO of Vuelio said:‘Social media has ushered in a new era of political immediacy that is reshaping how politicians engage with the public. While recognising that social media has improved transparency, four in five MPs believe it has changed public attitudes towards politicians for the worse. The depth of concern that MPs have is a timely reminder of the risks of social media as well as the potential it has to transform political engagement.’

After 3 years of dithering, u-turning and total confusion, last night Jeremy Corbyn finally gave up on trying to assert a Brexit policy on the Labour Party. He conceded to offering his cabinet a free vote in a second referendum should they win power…

Corbyn will also allow his MPs to campaign on either side of his proposed referendum – granting a huge choice between remaining, and staying in the customs union and regulatory orbit of the single market.

The move comes after Emily Thornberry’s excruciating Question Time appearance last week, where she had to explain with a straight face that if Labour came to power she would help negotiate a new deal with the EU, then campaign against it to stay in.

Meanwhile, deputy party leader Tom Watson has come up with yet another excuse to vote against a general election – saying there should be a second referendum beforehand. Maybe the new strategy is to make Britons so exhausted with as many votes as possible that they don’t notice Labour’s spinelessness…

Since the news of Theresa May’s resignation honours broke, Labour MPs have been falling over themselves to call for cricketing legend Geoffrey Boycott to have his proposed Knighthood withdrawn due to his abuse conviction. Harriet Harman, coincidentally running for the next speaker, has been vocally touring the studios…

Labour figures haven’t always been opposed to Boycott, in 2010 Ed Miliband described the England cricketer as “my hero”, due to being attracted to the “charisma of imperfection”. Who was deputy leader under Ed Miliband? None other than Harriet Harman…

The EU has announced the planned structure of Ursula von der Leyen’s forthcoming Commission, with a new college of eight ‘vice-presidents’. A whole swathe of new bureaucrats to be thoroughly bored by…

One role attracting attention, however, is that given to Greece’s Margaritis Schinas who will be taking up the role of ‘Protecting our European Way of Life’, which – when clarified – will cover migration and security. Guido’s sure if Donald Trump had created a ‘protecting our way of life’ job to deal with immigration, pro-EU lefties would be losing their heads…

A Sikh councillor in Plymouth has quit the Labour Party, saying membership is no longer compatible with his faith. This follows Labour becoming the second ever political party to be formally investigated by the Equality and Human Rights Commission, after the BNP…

In his resignation letter, Cllr Chaz Singh said his decision to resign was “based upon the fact that I believe that my continued membership is no longer compatible with my faith” saying concerns he had voiced had not been “addressed properly” by local party officials. His decision embarrassingly undermining Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi’s PMQs rant last week about Boris’s Burqa comments…

Later on Twitter, Singh claimed two more BAME UK Labour members in Plymouth have cancelled their membership. Local MP Luke Pollard has called for the newly-independent councillor to resign – rather than address Singh’s concerns with the Labour Party…

Keeping up the unprecedented practice of doorstepping a backroom advisor, Reuters went to Dominic Cummings’s house this morning who responded in his usual blunt way; saying “you guys need to get out of London – go and talk to people who aren’t rich remainers”. Watch above…

In perhaps the best news for Brexiteers since Boris became PM, the constitution-wrecker-in-chief, John Bercow has announced he will be standing down as speaker and an MP at the next election, following news the Tories were planning on fielding a candidate against him…

If an election passes tonight, he’ll stand down immediately. If not he’ll hang up his golden robes on the 31st October.

The man who’s done more than anyone to up-end Britain’s political institutions to suit his own aims announced his intention in the Commons just now via a personal statement, watched on by his wife Sally from the Gallery. Good riddance

In a last-minute desperate attempt to prevent prorogation, remain MPs have submitted a request for a Humble Address motion – an archaic procedure only used three times since 1866 – to force certain Special Advisers to handover their personal and private communications sent via Facebook, Whatsapp, iMessage, and private email, among other methods.A disturbing invasion of privacy…

It will be up to John Bercow to grant the debate, which will then require a vote, that if passed has been targeted at Government officials, some who have barely spent two weeks in their job:

Hugh Bennett

Simon Burton

Dominic Cummings

Nikki da Costa

Tom Irven

Sir Roy Stone

Christopher James

Lee Cain

Beatrice Timpson

And will include all communications relating to operation Yellowhammer sent via WhatsApp, Telegram, Signal, Facebook Messenger, private email accounts – both encrypted and unencrypted – text messages and iMessage. How the Remainer MPs will determine which messages are related or unrelated to Yellowhammer, or who will sift through the private contents of these personal devices is unknown.

We already know Cummings doesn’t believe MPs have the right to hand over this information, so be braced for another huge bust-up between Parliament and No. 10. Jokes on Remainer MPs when they find out Downing Street have exclusively been using the Matt Hancock app to communicate over the last couple of months…

When Amber Rudd resigned on Saturday night, she offered the explanation that there is “insufficient planning for a deal” by Downing Street. The only flaw with this explanation is that Amber Rudd did not sit on a single one of No. 10’s Brexit committees. So she was not privy to negotiating information…

The 0.5% growth rate – driven greatly by construction growth – comes after a 0.2% contraction in the second quarter of the year, and marks the strongest month of growth since January. 0.3% growth is three times higher than predicted – expect more economic predictions to be defied over the coming months…

In response to Len McCluskey’s statement of the blindingly obvious that the next general election will be about who the country trusts, Sky News‘ Jon Craig was caught demonstrating some top-tier sarcasm in response. Even on a Sunday evening, you can’t get anything past MediaGuido…

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